Quotes of the Day

We contend that for a nation to try to tax itself into prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the handle.
- Winston Churchill

A major source of objection to a free economy is precisely that it gives people what they want instead of what a particular group of people thinks they ought to want.  Underlying most arguments against a free market is a lack of belief in freedom itself.
- Milton Friedman


(And no, the picture shown above is not me trying on my Halloween costume a few days early to make sure it fits.  Then again ....)


    

Quote of the Day

This is another of those longer quotes, and one which I discovered while reading the weekend edition of the Wall Street Journal this morning.  It is however, one that I believes some due consideration for anyone trying to understand government in terms of historical perspective (this one comes from 1924), but especially in the election year of 2012.


The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives.  The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes.  The business of Conservatives is to prevent mistakes from being corrected.  Even when the revolutionist might himself repent of his revolution, the traditionalist is already defending it as part of his tradition.  Thus we have two great types ... the advanced person who rushes us into ruin, and the retrospective person who admires the ruins.  He admires them especially by moonlight, not to say moonshine.  Each new blunder of the progressive or prig becomes instantly a legend of immemorial antiquity for the snob.  This called the balance, or mutual check, in our Constitution.

- G K Chesterton 

Quote of the Day

 

(I wanted to put this up in the Quotes of the Week, but it was just too long.  It was also, on the other hand, far too good a quote to leave out.)

A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself. For the traitor appears not a traitor: he speaks in accents familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments, he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politic so that can no longer exist. A murderer is less to fear. The traitor is the plague.

- Marcus Tullius Cicero

Quote of the Day

It seems like I haven't done an extended quote in a while, but I'm just finishing up Milton and Rose Friedman's "Free to Choose", and this one about the Interstate Commerce Commission struck me as particularly appropriate when considering much of the bureaucratic overreach going on today, as well as the impending Supreme Court decision on the 'Patients Affordable Healthcare Act"  (and remember that this book was first published in 1980):

"The ICC illustrates what might be called the natural history of government intervention.  A real or fancied evil leads to demands to do something about it.  A political coalition forms consisting of sincere, high-minded reformers and equally sincere interested parties.  The incompatible objectives of the members of the coalition (e.g., low prices to consumers and high prices to producers) are glossed over by fine rhetoric about "the public interest," "fair competition," and the like.  The coalition succeeds in getting Congress (or a state legislature) to pass a law.  The preamble to the law pays lip service  to rhetoric and the body of the law grants power to government officials to "do something."  The high-minded reformers experience a glow of triumph and turn their attention to new causes.  The interested parties go to work to make sure that the power is used for their benefit.  They generally succeed.  Success breeds its problems, which are met by broadening the scope of intervention.  Bureaucracy takes its toll so that even the initial special interests no longer benefit.  In the end the effects are precisely the opposite of the objectives of the reformers and generally do not even achieve the objectives of the special interests.  Yet the activity is so firmly established and so many vested interests are connected with it that repeal of the initial legislation is nearly inconceivable.  Instead, new government legislation is called for to cope with the problems produced by the earlier legislation and a new cycle begins." 

"The Law"

Time and circumstance permit me a very little of the former to share something with you in the middle of the week. However, you're in luck.  Over the years and with the help of some pretty damn smart people that I've been lucky enough to know, I have slowly been gaining a bit of knowledge. Such knowledge, when acquired at all, is usually done by reading the words of much smarter people than me (a list almost as long as that of the National Register). The best of that knowledge was acquired by reading original source material.

Thanks to their advice, I am  able to say that I am becoming a good deal closer to the thinking of such giants as Thomas Sowell, Walter E Williams, Henry Hazlitt, and Milton Friedman (among others) whose books I have read. Many of these scholars and pundits have in turn referenced a writer from the 19^th Century, Frederic Bastiat, in tying their efforts to those of the past. More specifically they reference an essay of his first published in 1850, “The Law”.

With these limitations in mind, I am would like to share some brief part of that which I am currently reading. I hope that you appreciate it in the same way that I have, and promise to come up with something more original for the weekend.

“Since everybody traffics in law for his own profit, we should like to do the same. We should like to make it produce the right to assistance, which is the poor man's plunder. To effect this, we ought to be electors and legislators, that we may organize, on a large scale, alms for our own class, as you have organized, on a large scale, protection for yours.”

“Yes, as long as it is admitted that the law may be diverted from its true mission, that it may violate property instead of securing it, everybody will be wanting to manufacture law, either to defend himself against plunder, or to organize it for his own profit.”

“This plunder may be only an exceptional blemish in the legislation of a people, and in this case, the best thing that can be done is, without so many speeches and lamentations, to do away with it as soon as possible, notwithstanding the clamors of interested parties. But how is it to be distinguished? Very easily. See whether the law takes from some persons that which belongs to them, to give to others what does not belong to them. See whether the law performs for the profit of one citizen, and, to the injury of others, an act that this citizen cannot perform without committing a crime.”

“And this is what has taken place. The delusion of the day is to enrich all classes at the expense of each other; it is to generalize plunder under the pretense of organizing it. Now, legal plunder may be exercised in an infinite multitude of plans for organization; tariffs, protection, perquisites, gratuities, encouragements, progressive taxation, free public education, right to work, right to profit, right to wages, right to assistance, right to instruments of labor, gratuity of credit, etc., etc. And it is all these plans, taken as a whole, with what they have in common, legal plunder, that takes the name of socialism.” 

  

Education Quotes

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My disdain for some of that which calls itself higher education has been increased recently by some of those in 'Occupy' movements across the country.  It appears however, that I am not alone; and that such thinking has roots in minds far greater than mine for a far greater period than I have been around:

Education is an admirable thing, but it is well to remember from time to time that nothing that is worth knowing can be taught. 
- Oscar Wilde

Education is a state-controlled manufactory of echoes.
- Norman Douglas

An education was a bit like a communicable sexual disease.  It made you unsuitable for a lot of jobs and then you had the urge to pass it on.
Terry Pratchett

Nothing in education is so astonishing as the amount of ignorance it accumulates in the form of inert facts.
- Henry Adams

Education is a method whereby one acquires a higher grade of prejudices.
- Laurence J Peter
  
The advantage of a classical education is that it enables you to despise the wealth that it prevents you from achieving.
- Russell Green

Strange as it seems, no amount of learning can cure stupidity, and higher education positively fortifies it.
- Stephen Vizinczey

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Occasional Brilliance

I was having a electronic conversation with the Toledo Free Press Editor-in-Chief Michael Miller yesterday about his most recent effort for the paper (an exceptional piece, BTW) and my own two lesser efforts of the last week.  Michael, being the gentleman that he is (and recognizing that praise is often the only wage of such efforts), was very complimentary of my work, citing amongst other things, a level of consistent achievement.  I responded that I would trade much of such consistency for occasional flashes of brilliance.

Alas, such things are rare indeed ....  which got me thinking about what to write this weekend after having already offered a piece on the coming anniversary of 9/11 in the TFP.  And while I hope that all are able to take a bit of time this weekend to remember both the tragedy of the event and the heroism that came about as a result of it, I was left with the need to put something up this weekend.

I came to the realization that perhaps putting some of those brilliant efforts up this weekend was just the balm that my aching spirit needed.  I therefore offer what at least I consider to be some fine efforts in turning a phrase.  Knowing that like my efforts for the TFP I will be overshadowed, I will never the less put a few of my own quotations up in the 'Quotes of the Week' section (in some way making this a honest writing effort).


One of the lessons of history is that nothing is often a good thing to do and always a clever thing to say.
- Will Durant

When men are pure, laws are useless; when men are corrupt, laws are broken.
- Benjamin Disraeli

 More than any other time in history, mankind faces a crossroads.  One path leads to despair and utter hopelessness.  The other, to total extinction.  Let us pray we have the wisdom to choose correctly.
- Woody Allen

The enemy is anybody who's going to get you killed, no matter which side he's on.
- Joseph Heller

The two most common elements in the universe are Hydrogen and stupidity.
- Harlan Ellison

He who builds a better mousetrap these days runs into material shortages, patent-infringement suits, work stoppages, collusive bidding, discount discrimination, and taxes.
- H E Martz

Nature is trying very hard to make us succeed, but nature does not depend on us.  We are not the only experiment.
- R Buckminster Fuller

In times like these, it helps to recall that there have always been times like these.
- Paul Harvey

The nice part about being a pessimist is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised.
- George F Will

If you put the Federal government in charge of the Sahara Desert, in five years there'd be a shortage of sand.
- Milton Friedman

Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world.  Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.
- Margaret Mead

The United States is a nation of laws: badly written and randomly enforced.
- Frank Zappa

This country has come to feel the same when Congress is in session as when the baby gets hold of the hammer.
- Will Rogers

A liberal is a man too broadminded to take his own side in a quarrel.
- Robert Frost

The essence of Government is power; and power, lodged as it must be in human hands, will ever be liable to abuse.
- James Madison

Genius may have its limitations, but stupidity is not thus handicapped.
- Elbert Hubbard

Those who welcome death have only tried it from the ears up.
- Wilson Mizner

Ninety percent of everything is crap.
- Theodore Sturgeon
 

Quote of the Day

As many people know, I love a good quotation; and am proud of the fact that I have been known to come up with a witticism or two of my own. I seldom include 'Quotes of the Day' however, since I added the 'Quotes of the Week' section to the blog. Like all rules, there are always exceptions, and this one seemed particularly exceptional. I hope you find it equally interesting. 


"You need only reflect that one of the best ways to get yourself a reputation as a dangerous citizen these days is to go about repeating the very phrases which our Founding Fathers used in the struggle for independence." 
- Charles Austin Beard

Quotes of the Day

It being a Monday, not normally a day for me to post, I decided to pull a couple of bits from the Higgins "Bag of Wisdom" (or nonsense, depending on your point of view). 








My closet contains more skeletons than most medical schools. It has become such a problem that I often have trouble hanging up my clothes. 


I find it both infuriating and ironic that God can curse me with a level of talent that does not allow me to do as well as I would like, the things I would so love to be able to; and bless me with the intelligence to recognize it.

Quote of the Day

The 'Scott Brown Message' to current members of Congress: 


"Do you remember when we objected to the stimulus packages, a budget with a huge deficit, and health care reform; and you told us our problem was that we don't get it? Well, do you also remember that job in Washington DC that you expected to have after the next election? ... You don't get it." 
- me

Quote of the Day

The free market is innocent. But it's fair to say that crony capitalism created the economic mess. ... What is crony capitalism? It's the economic system in which the marketplace is substantially shaped by a cozy relationship among government, big business and big labor. Under crony capitalism, government bestows a variety of privileges that are simply unattainable in the free market, including import restrictions, bailouts, subsidies and loan guarantees. ... 
- John Stossel

Wisdom For The New Decade

In keeping with a tradition from Just Blowing Smoke, I am attempting to take the easy way out on this first weekend of the year by attempting to foist some of my own collected maxims as some form of wisdom. I hope that you enjoy them, and that they lead you to a path of reason, responsibility, and ridiculousness.

• My only prejudice is against people who choose to be stupid.
• A lack of understanding where the rules are concerned should never prevent a person from playing the game. Take love for example ...
• I usually find it easiest to resolve to eat a healthier diet right after a big meal of junk food.
• Politicians are like the color swatches on paint chips. While many of them look good on initial inspection, most look far less attractive when committed to.
• Anyone who tells you that they "understand" something is trying to sell you a book.
• Any statement purported to be fact that contains the word "always" or "never" can usually be counted on to be wrong.
• Few things in life are best confronted with ones eyes closed. I may be the exception that proves the rule.
• Scientists have a funny way of taking a perfectly reasonable observation and turning it into a completely unreasonable assumption of fact.
• We should find great relief in that fact that our government is normally so bogged down in bureaucracy and ineptitude that ends up accomplishing very little. This functional failure is probably the only thing that keeps it from "saving us to death".
• The advantage of writing over speaking is the ability to endlessly edit before revealing your thoughts. Such a process usually makes one look far more intelligent than they actually are, and prevents any number of hurt feeling. I highly recommend it.

May you all have a wonderful 2010 and a great new decade.

Quote of the Day

It will be of little avail to the people that the laws are made by men of their own choice if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be understood; if they be repealed or revised before they are promulgated, or undergo such incessant changes that no man, who knows what the law is today, can guess what it will be tomorrow. Law is defined to be a rule of action; but how can that be a rule, which is little known and less fixed? 
- James Madison

Quote of the Day

If the American people allow the banks to control the issuance of currency, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the people of all property until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers occupied. 
- Thomas Jefferson

Quote of the Day

"It's not that most politicians want to help you, it's that most politicians simply want to be seen to be helping you that should truly terrify each of us."  
- me

Election Day Eve Quotes of the Day

As we all gather our thoughts before entering the polling place (except you wise few who voted early), I thought that I would share with you a bit of appropriate wisdom from one of my favorite authors, Robert Heinlein.  

If you are part of a society that votes, then do so. There may be no candidates and no measures you want to vote for ... but there are certain to be ones you want to vote against. In case of doubt, vote against. By this rule you will rarely go wrong. If this is too blind for your taste, consult some well-meaning fool (there is always one around) and ask his advice. Then vote the other way. This enables you to be a good citizen (if such is your wish) without spending the enormous amount of time on it that truly intelligent exercise of franchise requires.

 

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There are hidden contradictions in the minds of people who "love Nature" while deploring the "artificialialities" with which "Man has spoiled 'Nature'." The obvious contradiction lies in their choice of words, which imply that Man and his artifacts are not part of "Nature" - but beavers and their dams are. But the contradictions go deeper than this prima-facie absurdity. In declaring his love for a beaver dam (erected by beavers for beavers' purposes) and his hatred for dams erected by men (for the purposes of men) the "Naturist" reveals his hatred for his own race - i.e., his own self-hatred. In the case of "Naturists" such self-hatred is understandable; they are a sorry lot. But hatred is too strong an emotion to feel toward them; pity and contempt are the most they rate.

Health Care Quote

Well, the combined Congressional Health Care bill is out, to the tune of just under 2000 pages. There is so much that I would like to say about this odious piece of legislation, but right now I am simply dumbfounded by the carbon footprint of printing it out, let alone the time and effort of reading it. While I am sure that I will have more to say on the subject after I have done so, I wanted to at least say something. Here it is:  

"If this is the future of health care in America, I fear that my long term plans to deal with personal illness will fall under much the same category as that of many southern states when dealing with snowfall. God put it here, and He can take it away." 

Quote of the Day

I received this as a forwarded email message, and thought that it was definitely worth sharing with you. As the story goes, this was a contest winner from Texas A and M University at coming up with the most appropriate definition of a contemporary term.  

"Political Correctness is a doctrine, fostered by delusional, illogical minority, and rabidly promoted by an unscrupulous mainstream media, which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a turd by the clean end." 

Stranger In A Strange Land

I had recently been given a stern medical recommendation to abandon some of the heavy reading that I have been doing ("American Progressivism" and "The 5000 Year Leap") in favor of a lighter literary burden. Having read all of the rest of my stack at home, I decided to return to an old friend, "Stranger In A Strange Land", by Robert Heinlein. 

Since Heinlein is one of my all-time favorite authors and science fiction is the literature that got me hooked on reading, this was a real vacation. Originally published in 1961, some of the technology discussed now seems either primitive or far-fetched, but the techno toys were as much an excuse to send a message as anything else in Heinlein novels. Like many sci-fi writers, Heinlein had a lot to say about improving society, and used the future to do so. 

But why talk about this mid-week, when I usually discuss something political? The answer is simple, it is because re-reading this book reminded me of something that I used to know before taking up the subject of politics and government more seriously, both in this blog and in the columns that I write for the Toledo Free Press. Heinlein had a universal distrust of government and politicians and expressing it was a common theme in his writing: 
 

"Of course the game is rigged. Don't let that stop you. If you don't play, you can't win."  

This is not to say that all elections are rigged (though you would be hard pressed to convince the people of Afghanistan that), but rather that politicians set up the system, so of course the rules favor them. That doesn't mean that we have to to like the rules and that we shouldn't try to throw in a monkey wrench when the opportunity presents itself. If you sit on the sidelines though, there is little chance that you will have any influence or that things have anything more than a hope of getting better.  

"Stupidity cannot be cured by money, or through education, or by legislation. Stupidity is not a sin, the victim cannot help being stupid. But stupidity is the only universal capital crime: the sentence is death, there is no appeal and execution is carried out automatically and without pity." 

To me the meaning is clear here. Those who take on the mantle of aggressive ignorance (sometimes almost gleefully) where their government and leadership is concerned have no reason of surprise or complaint when Darwin's theories place them in the same category as that of the carrier pigeon and the dodo bird. Truth be known, the rest of us may be better off without them.  

"Beware of altruism. It is based on self-deception, the root of all evil" 

Government these days seems intent on taking care of us whether we want them to or not. They tell us that they do this in large part because the world is too complicated for us to handle it on our own. In other words, they are doing this out of the best, the kindest, and the most altruistic of motives. Invariably, they are wrong, and in the worst way.  

"A motion to adjourn is always in order." 

I have always taken this to mean that government does the least harm when it does the least. I believe that history will prove me out on this one. This is why I am so concerned about a government that is now so concerned with every fiddlin' detail of our lives. 

I live for the days when Congress is not in session, knowing these days that the more time they spend not legislating and regulating, the happier that I am and the more freedom I keep. You see, the reading of my youth prepared me for the place where I am today. The lessons that I learned (and recently relearned) about life from Robert Heinlein still stand me in good stead. As for "Stranger ...", it simply reminds me what an odd duck we Conservatives are in this encroaching world of liberalism and progressivism, causing us to feel like strangers in a strange land. I have hopes however that with or without reading one of my literary heroes, such will not always be the case. In the spirit of full disclosure, I should also point out what Heinlein said about those engaging in pursuits like this blog:  

"Writing is never something to be ashamed of, but do it in private and wash your hands afterward." 

If you will excuse me, I have a date with some soap and water ... (BTW, for those of you who 'grok' Heinlein, I am thinking a lot lately of changing my name to Jubal or Lazarus.) 
 

Quote of the Day

"There is no maxim in my opinion which is more liable to be misapplied, and which therefore needs elucidation than the current one that the interest of the majority is the political standard of right and wrong ... In fact it is only reestablishing under another name and a more specious form, force as the measure of right."  

- James Madison